Sally Mathews

Sally Nance Hickman Mathews 8/6/1945 ~ 11/1/2018 Sally was born on August 6, 1945 in Harrisonburg, VA and passed on November 1, 2018 from a glioblastoma brain tumor. Beloved friend, mother, sister, aunt, and "Gram", Sally is survived by daughters Kelly Jane Mathews (David von Holder) and Tracy Nance Mathews Geraghty (David), four treasured grandsons, Liam and Miles von Holder, and Aiden and Julian Geraghty, her sister, Annie Hickman (Allynn Gooen, Ozzie), and brother Andy Hickman (Janet, Patty & Kathy). Sally was loved by many and will be dearly missed by all friends and family. CHILDHOOD Sally was born to Mary Jewett Shilton and George Robert Hickman, Jr., in Harrisonburg, Virginia. Sally grew up in Aurora, Illinois, in a farmhouse that housed her father's veterinary hospital on the ground floor. Her trapeze hung in a tree outside, not far from the winter ice skating pond. From a young age, Sally was a bookworm, a nature lover, a singer with a clear and lovely soprano tone, and a girl with a quietly bold sense of adventure. Young Sally's adventures ranged from singing in church choirs, ballet en pointe, curling up with her nose in a book, assisting her dad in emergency pet surgeries, hiking and fossil hunting, frightening her younger siblings and friends with her "Bloody Bones" stories, eating softshell crab on the porch of her paternal grandparents' (Henrietta Disney and GR Hickman Sr.) historic home on the banks of the Indian River in Delaware, dining at the Women's Athletic Club & visiting Chicago museums with her maternal grandmother (Miriam Baldwin and Earl Astor Shilton), and endless hours barefoot on the beach & frolicking in the waves at the family summer cottage in Harbert, Michigan. After graduating from Aurora West High School, Sally studied liberal arts at Cornell College in Iowa. STARTING A FAMILY The summer that she turned 20, Sally met and fell in love with Stephen Maxson Mathews of San Francisco on the shores of Lake Michigan. Readying for a post to Japan as a new Air Force officer, Steve was visiting his uncle's neighboring cottage in Harbert and his grandparents William and Jane Greene in Aurora. Their two families already had a long history of friendship. Sally and Steve corresponded overseas until their wedding. She famously said that when she met him at the airport prior to the wedding, she hoped she'd recognize him - they'd been together in person just 11 days! Sally and Steve began their life together in Japan, where they made close friends, skied Mt Shiga, and traveled the old country staying in traditional ryokan inns. They were sorry to leave Japan upon being reposted to Honolulu, where Kelly was born (perhaps a product island fever?). As a 22-year-old new mother, Sally walked the beach, watching ships coming in and out of Pearl Harbor as the local ladies collected seaweed from the Ewa Beach shoreline and baby Kelly slept. One year later, they returned to the mainland for Steve to finish graduate school in Washington state, and Tracy was born in Aurora four days after Christmas, less than two years younger than Kelly. After Steve finished his master's degree, the young family moved into a new Eichler home in Sunnyvale, California, where Steve worked for NASA AMES Research. Our family included Fiddle (a black cockapoo, their first baby, born in Hawaii before Kelly) and Banjo (our black cat). FAMILY LIFE Sally was a loving and adventurous young mom. Early family life consisted of pool parties and playdates in the backyard of our home, driving us girls to ballet and piano lessons, co-leading our Brownie Girl Scout troop, sailing on the San Francisco Bay in "Gypsy" our Balboa 26 and with Steve's Belvedere-based family, skiing at Alpine Meadows, and spending time every summer in Harbert, collecting beach stones and crinoids, walking in the woods. She taught us songs and harmonies, and she made up the best bedtime stories (starring our alter egos, Shelly & Stacy). All the while, Sally nurtured her own passion for singing - discovering a vibrant community with the Mission Valley Sweet Adelines chorus (winning International and performing in a Kellogg's Special K commercial), and singing with dear friends in a quartet, Joyful Noise. A job offer for Steve in 1979 led to what Sally embraced as a new adventure - a move to southern California! A lovely home in Palos Verdes, a new community of women's and men's Barbershop choruses & quartets, hosting friends' weddings and festive parties for her tradition-breaking and award-winning quartet Sundance, and LA South Towns chorus. In 1987, Sundance was invited to join the Los Angeles Music Center's Mark Taper Forum production of Babbitt, A Marriage, earning Sally her Screen Actors Guild (SAG) card. INDEPENDENCE Growing girls, greater expenses, and Sally's desire to work out of the home led to a shifting family dynamic over the course of the following decade, and Sally and Steve ended their marriage in 1988. Sally moved in to a small home in San Pedro and embraced life as a working girl in her early 40s. She excelled in her first role as an executive administrative assistant for Dan Selleck (Tom's brother). With a love affair in the early 90s, she moved to Oakland. (Patrick invited her first for a whirlwind 3-week trip to the French countryside, shortly followed by a move to Oakland. She always professed to be thrilled and seduced by the prospect of travel!) That loving relationship lasted several years, but wasn't to last. Sally found peace in her solitude, richness in friendships, and made a lovely home and full life for herself on Oak Crest Drive in Oakland. She returned to school while working in a San Francisco law firm, completed her interrupted Bachelor's degree in Management, and obtained a Paralegal certificate from Saint Mary's College. Again, she distinguished herself as an Executive Legal Secretary. Sally loved commuting into & working in The City of San Francisco, and was an early adopter of the "Casual Carpool." She took sandwiches for lunch so she could embrace every opportunity for a theater show or symphony concert after work. RETIREMENT & GRANDMOTHERHOOD